Written by

Free Press Staff Writer

Later that year, the Ford Motor Company launched a new line of cars it touted as innovative and revolutionary. According to a 2011 blog post on www.bloomberg.com by Roger Horowitz, Ford advertised with a “flier launching the 1958 line, headlined ‘This is the Edsel — never before a car like it,’ (that) promoted a dizzying 18 different models.”

Instead, the debut of the Edsel was the start of one of the greatest debacles in automotive history.

Such a notion never occurred to the young Charlie Smith, who was struck by the car’s design.

“I thought they were a great car. I liked the looks and hopefully I could buy or purchase one one day,” said the New Haven resident.

In 2000, well after the Edsel entered automotive lore as a costly and unmitigated disaster, Smith finally bought his Edsel, a 1959 Ranger.

“It had been sitting in a meadow for a year or two,” said Smith, who negotiated with the owner. “It was kind of rusty, the trunk was gone, the bottom was gone.

“Otherwise, it wasn’t too bad, the frame, the firewalls and the fenders,” said Smith, who said the owner agreed to the sale since he already had more cars than he was prepared to restore.

Smith put $4,500 into repairing the body at Gil’s Garage in New Haven Junction. He also approached a mechanic and asked, “Do you mind changing the wires, hoses and belts? I don’t want to get stuck some place. He said, ‘It would be my pleasure. I can get at the stuff in here,’” a backhand remark toward the cramped and crowded aspects of today’s vehicles.

Smith’s Edsel Ranger came off the assembly line in Louisville, Ky., on May 14, 1959. It has a two-speed transmission, no power steering and no power brakes. The base price was $2,683. It sports a 321-cubic inch engine, though that isn’t original. “It came with a straight-6 but somebody converted it before I bought it,” said Smith, who said the Edsel is his only foray into older cars.

“For its time, it was really a good car,” said Smith. “It had a lot of features on it that cars that day didn’t have.

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“You punched in the shifter in the steering wheel, which caused new problems because mechanics didn’t know how to service it,” Smith said. “It was the first to have self-adjusting brakes and a padded dash.”

So why did the Edsel fail? Among the factors cited by Horowitz in his Bloomberg blog were the Edsel’s front grill that was ridiculed, promotion of the car’s ease of operation that gave it a feminine touch in a male-dominated market and a failure in general to define its prospective customers by trying to appeal to too wide a range of customers.

Smith added, “To begin with, the economy was going downhill in ’58 and these were pricey compared to other cars on the market.

“One of the big mistakes is they didn’t keep it with the Ford line. They made it a separate line like Cadillac or Pontiac but they didn’t have a facility for it. They mixed it in with Ford cars and the guys who made (Fords) were upset. They were making cars for another division not their own and they just threw them together,” Smith said.

In addition, the promotion glitches kept piling up. Smith said he has an article concerning television’s Edsel Hour, which featured a number of the day’s entertainment superstars. Among them was Frank Sinatra, who went to open the door of an Edsel on The Edsel Hour, only to have the handle fall off, Smith said.

That aside, the dream of owning an Edsel remained with Smith. With time and patience, he found his Edsel and he has enjoyed it.

“I drive it quite a bit in the summer. I didn’t buy it for the purpose of letting it sit or going to shows,” he said. “I do show it but it’s not really a top-line show car.”

Still, he said, “People come up to me and say they’ve never seen an Edsel,” he said, adding that many younger people are unaware of its notorious role in automotive history.

The Edsel Ranger attracts attention. One day upon exiting a restaurant, he found a man standing next to it. “He asked if he could sit in it. He said he used to have an Edsel. He just wanted to look at the dash because it was beautiful,” Smith recalled.

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Smith said his wife, Ella, “loves to drive in it.”

“We have a good time in it. It’s a different experience. She kind of likes the big, curved windshield, the little v-shaped (vent) window and the wings on it,” Smith said.

“The only thing we don’t like about it is there are no seat belts,” said Smith, who said he was assured by a state trooper that riding in it without seatbelts is legal since they weren’t original to the car.

As for putting in seat belts, he replied, “The car itself is not made for them. (Shoulder belts) might do more harm to the passenger than good. You might be able to put in waist belts, but I don’t know where you could anchor them.”

He’s received a few offers to sell but pointed out that the Ranger is “one of the least desirable Edsels out there” because of the number built.

“I’ve got more money into it that I could get out of it and I enjoy it,” he said, adding, “If you’ve got a 1960 convertible, then you’ve got some money. That’s a desirable car.”

The Smiths occasionally attend area car shows but his enjoyment is taking rides in the area.

“It runs pretty good. The motor doesn’t burn any oil. There is a little transmission leak but it’s not bad,” said Smith, adding, “I don’t know if I’d want to head out West with it.”

Decades after the Edsel, named for the son of Ford founder Henry Ford, because the universal butt of scorn and jokes, Charlie Smith proudly and happily remains behind the wheel of his 1959 Ranger.